CHAPTER 14 PSYCHIA

fear

feeling afraid or threatened by a clearly identifiable external stimulus that represents danger to the person.

Anxiety disorders

comprise a group of conditions that share a key feature of excessive anxiety with ensuing behavioral, emotional, cognitive, and physiological responses.

Stress

the wear and tear that life causes on the body

Selective mutism

diagnosed in children when they fail to speak in social situations even though they are able to speak.

Anxiety disorder due to another medical condition

diagnosed when the prominent symptoms of anxiety are judged to result directly from a physiological condition.

Substance/medication-induced anxiety disorder

anxiety directly caused by drug abuse, a medication, or exposure to a toxin. Symptoms include prominent anxiety, panic attacks, phobias, obsessions, or compulsions.

Separation anxiety disorder

excessive anxiety concerning separation from home or from persons, parents, or caregivers to whom the client is attached. It occurs when it is no longer developmentally appropriate and before 18 years of age

Defense mechanisms

are cognitive distortions that a person uses unconsciously to maintain a sense of being in control of a situation, to lessen discomfort, and to deal with stress.

Gamma-aminobutyric acid (GABA)

the amino acid neurotransmitter believed to be dysfunctional in anxiety disorders.

Serotonin

the indolamine neurotransmitter usually implicated in psychosis and mood disorders

5-Hydroxytryptamine type 1a

plays a role in anxiety, and it also affects aggression and mood.

Intrapsychic/Psychoanalytic Theories

Freud (1936) saw a person’s innate anxiety as the stimulus for behavior.

Interpersonal Theory

Harry Stack Sullivan (1952) viewed anxiety as being generated from problems in interpersonal relationships.

Behavioral Theory

Behavioral theorists view anxiety as being learned through experiences

Decatastrophizing

involves the therapist’s use of questions to more realistically appraise the situation.

Assertiveness training

helps the person take more control over life situations. These techniques help the person negotiate interpersonal situations and foster self-assurance.

Panic disorder

composed of discrete episodes of panic attacks, that is, 15 to 30 minutes of rapid, intense, escalating anxiety in which the person experiences great emotional fear as well as physiological discomfort.

agoraphobia

fear of the marketplace” or fear of being outside

Primary gain

the relief of anxiety achieved by performing the specific anxiety-driven behavior, such as staying in the house to avoid the anxiety of leaving a safe place.

Secondary gain

the attention received from others as a result of these behaviors.

PHOBIAS

an illogical, intense, and persistent fear of a specific object or a social situation that causes extreme distress and interferes with normal functioning.

Social anxiety or phobia

anxiety provoked by certain social or performance situations

Natural environmental phobias

fear of storms, water, heights, or other natural phenomena

Blood–injection phobias

fear of seeing one’s own or others’ blood, traumatic injury, or an invasive medical procedure such as an injection

Situational phobias

fear of being in a specific situation such as on a bridge or in a tunnel, elevator, small room, hospital, or airplane

Animal phobia

fear of animals or insects (usually a specific type; often, this fear develops in childhood and can continue through adulthood in both men and women; cats and dogs are the most common phobic objects)

social phobia

the person becomes severely anxious to the point of panic or incapacitation when confronting situations involving people.

Flooding

a form of rapid desensitization in which a behavioral therapist confronts the client with the phobic object (either a picture or the actual object) until it no longer produces anxiety.